The tie that binds, or, God is a DJ

I realized that Nicky has an inordinate number of close friends in Second Life who are DJ’s (20 or so at last count).  Even in real life, I can't claim to be friends with that many people in my own profession.   It’s a fact that’s had a profound impact on my experience of Second Life.  Music IS a passion for me both in First and Second Life.   It’s always on…if not in world then on Winamp or my iTouch or the cd player.  Often times the same music is playing as I travel from Second Life to my car to my work and back home again.  For better or worse, this tends to blur the boundaries between those locations to me.   The music helps me make the transition from one place to the other and back again. 

It was music that kept me in Second Life.  After my initial month or two of wandering around lost, wondering where all the people were…I accidently stumbled into the Blueboy dance club where there was a live dj (Wesley Spengler) who actually greeted me by name, on air,  in World.  This was in the days before voice was incorporated into Second Life so it was pretty significant to a noob like me.  No one spoke then.  Yet this DJ, who was rocking the club and a big group of people, had singled me out and spoke directly to me.   Whoever coined the phrase “God is a DJ” must have had a similar experience.

For me, it was like that scene in Wizard of Oz where Dorothy opens the door to her house just after crashing in Munchkinland.  Everything suddenly turned to Technicolor.  It was my first (and up until that time), most profound experience of what it could feel like to be enveloped in a truly immersive environment.  At the time it was also the most revealing example of the social nature of Second Life.  Wes has a way of making everyone feel welcomed and “seen”.   That is his gift as a DJ.  The people there were open and welcoming.  (Which also speaks to Wes’s nature as a person and as a DJ. And to the kind of energy he tries to surround himself with.)   I met people that night who are still a part of my Second Life nearly 5 years later.  It was like walking into my favorite neighborhood bar.  And, at that moment, I got what all the hype about Second Life had been about. 

More powerfully for me, the medium connecting everyone that night was music.  So, double whammy for me.  Before that moment, everything had been in black & white.  I’d been disappointed and frankly bored up to then by my experiences in SL.  I was about to drop it and move on to something else.  (The denizens of World of Warcraft may now heave a collective sigh of relief.)  But the moment Wes called out my name in the darkness of that club, the nature of Second Life changed for me forever.  I got it.

As I’ve said, for me, music is a powerful force.  Especially in an environment where nothing is exactly as it appears to be.  It’s easy to feel disconnected in SL.  There’s an odd duality to everything…even the name.  Everything is real but not real.  The avatars aren’t real, but the people behind them are, as are the emotions they share there.

For me, music is the most direct route for translating feelings into something palpable and real.  The power it holds is that it touches people so easily and profoundly.  My most social experiences in Second Life have been shaped by it.  For me, Dj’s are the conduit which translate the fantasy of Second Life into the reality of a social connection.  This is the power they wield.  DJ’s (and the music they share with us there) are truly one of the strongest ties that bind us together in SL.

I know there’s more to Second Life than clubs and dancing.  But in terms of feeling truly immersed in a 3D social environment, nothing has ever come as close to the feeling I get, as when Nicky wades into a group of people at a club and shares an hour or two of music, dancing.

Some of my Favorite Second Life DJ's

DJ Wesley Spengler

DJ Zann Baxton

DJ Mike Dacook (photo courtesy Mike Dacook)

 

DJ Aeschylus Shepherd

 

DJ Merrick Ying (photo courtesy Merrick Ying)

DJ Sofia Diage (photo courtesy Sofia Diage)

DJ  Dextrum Boucher (photo courtesy Dextrum Boucher)

DJ Regi Yifu

 

DJ Ritch Nicholls (photo courtesy Ritch Nichols)

DJ Evermore Noel (photo courtesy Lanne Wise)

DJ Tyago Kidd

DJ Annie McMahon